Business Editors LOCKPORT, N.Y.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--July 18, 2001--First Niagara Financial Group, Inc. (NASDAQ:FNFG) announced today that its Board of Directors has declared a quarterly dividend of nine cents ($0.09) per share on outstanding FNFG common stock. The dividend is payable on August 14, 2001 to stockholders of record on July 31, 2001. First Niagara Financial Group, Inc. is a $2.7 billion multi-bank holding company and is the parent of First Niagara Bank, Cortland Savings Bank and Cayuga Bank. Press releases are being distributed by Business Wire and can be found on the Internet, as well as appropriate trade media and financial disclosure circuits. News, analyst presentations and other information about the Corporation are available on the Internet at the Corporation's website, http://www.firstniagarafinancial.com. For additional information about First Niagara Financial Group, Inc. please contact: -0- *T Corporate Information First Niagara Financial Group, Inc. 6950 South Transit Road P.O. Box 514 Lockport, New York 14095-0514 Telephone (800) 201-6621 Website: http://www.firstniagarafinancial.com Transfer Agent and Registrar Mellon Investor Services, LLC P.O. Box 3315 South Hackensack, NJ 07606 Telephone (877) 785-9670 Website: http://www.mellon-investor.com -0- --30--nf/ny* csm CONTACT: Investor Relations: Christopher J. Thome, 716/625-7645 Assistant Vice President Reporting and Investor Relations Manager chris.thome@firstniagarabank.com or Media Relations: Leslie G. Garrity, 716/625-7528 Assistant Vice President Public Relations and Corporate Communications Manager leslie.garrity@firstniagarabank.com KEYWORD: NEW YORK INDUSTRY KEYWORD: BANKING DIVIDEND
A study of almost 4,000 UK mobile users by Forrester Research suggests a rising appetite for mobile commerce, with almost a fifth claiming that mobile plays an important role in researching product purchases. The research carried out in Q2 2010 shows that heavy mobile internet users aged 25-34 are especially keen on m-commerce.
Nearly a fifth (17%) of all UK mobile users expressed an interest in using their mobile to research a purchase and compare prices. One in ten (11%) said they would like to redeem coupons on their mobile and 12% said they use their phones to locate nearby stores.
The survey of 4,000 UK mobile users found that 7% downloaded at least one app a month and 4% research products for purchase on their handset. However, 31% of heavy mobile internet users aged 25-34 claimed to download apps at least once a month.
Sony Ericsson and Apple are the most popular handset brands among heavy mobile internet users in the age group, commanding market shares of 19% and 18% respectively. RIM's BlackBerry had a 6% share, lagging behind Samsung and Nokia.
Andrew Tweddle
Copyright: Centaur Communications Ltd. and licensors
SEVEN[R] Networks, a provider of innovative mobile solutions that deliver a Real Life, Real Time experience, announced it has been chosen by AlwaysOn as one of the OnMobile Top 100 winners. Inclusion in the OnMobile 100 signifies leadership for SEVEN amongst its peers and game-changing approaches and technologies that are likely to disrupt existing markets and entrenched players. SEVEN was specially selected by the AlwaysOn editorial team and industry experts spanning the globe based on a set of five criteria: innovation, market potential, commercialization, stakeholder value and media buzz.
SEVEN and the OnMobile Top 100 companies will be honored at AlwaysOn's OnMobile event on June 15th, 2011, at The Fox Theatre in Redwood City, CA. This two-day executive event features CEO presentations and high-level debates on how the top emerging mobile companies are creating new business opportunities in the hot, high-growth mobile market.
"The mobile market is booming, as evidenced by top researchers, who are predicting that more smartphones will be shipped in 2012 than PCs, and there will be more mobile Internet users than PC Internet users by 2014," said Tony Perkins, founder and editor of AlwaysOn. "This explosive market is being driven by the companies that made this year's OnMobile Top 100 list. We congratulate the OnMobile 100, a great list of companies that our editors believe represent some of the highest-growth opportunities in the private company marketplace."
The OnMobile 100 winners were selected from among hundreds of other technology companies nominated by investors, bankers, journalists, and industry insiders. The AlwaysOn editorial team conducted a rigorous three-month selection process to finalize the 2011 list.
SEVEN's Open Channel wireless traffic optimization platform helps carriers reduce the amount of smartphone traffic on their networks by up to 40% by optimizing network access and data transfer for any mobile app, including email, IM, Facebook, and more. Open Channel cuts network signaling, bandwidth usage and improves smartphone battery life. This innovative traffic optimization solution builds on SEVEN's push platform and mobile applications that keep mobile users in sync with their personal and business life. With SEVEN, consumers enjoy an optimized experience with easy access to messages and the convenience of SEVEN's desktop-like user interface, which results in increased adoption and customer loyalty.
"To be included in this first annual list among such extraordinary peers is an honor," said Ross Bott, president and CEO of SEVEN. "The industry recognition of Open Channel has been astounding and just further inspires SEVEN to continue its development of new, innovative solutions that better the mobile industry as a whole."
A full list of all the OnMobile Top 100 winners can be found on the AlwaysOn website at: http://www.aonetwork.com/AOStory/Announcing-2011-OnMobile-100-Top-Private-Companies About SEVEN Founded in 2000, SEVEN Networks helps carriers and handset manufacturers deliver a Real Life, Real Time™ mobile experience through its push-based software platform and applications that deliver data to devices in a way that is network efficient. Its SEVEN Open Channel™ is a breakthrough mobile traffic optimization software solution that cuts the data consumption of smartphones and mobile devices by up to 70 percent. SEVEN's flagship application, push email, and its underlying platform are in production in 14 languages across the five continents, and support more than 800 device models across eight operating systems. More information is at http://www.seven.com/index.html.
Keywords: Networks, SEVEN Networks, Software, Technology.
This article was prepared by Telecommunications Weekly editors from staff and other reports. Copyright 2011, Telecommunications Weekly via VerticalNews.com.
Innovative cloud storage provider commits to ecosystem dedicated to working with ARM server innovator to improve datacenter and server efficiency
SUNNYVALE, Calif. -- Gluster, the leading provider of scale-out, open source storage solutions, today announced it is among the first companies to join the Calxeda Trailblazer Initiative, an industry ecosystem of companies dedicated to improving server and datacenter efficiency. Gluster was selected by Calxeda to be a Trailblazer, and as such, will be first to begin proof of concept testing this fall. For more information, please see the release on the launch of the Calxeda Trailblazer Initiative, issued today.
"As volumes of information increase daily, storage continues to be the holy grail. Gluster's scale-out NAS approach for cloud and virtual machine environments combined with Calxeda's scale-out architecture will be a formidable player in all things datacenter storage," said Barry Evans, CEO, Calxeda. "Collaborating, as we will do with Gluster as an early member of Trailblazer, will enable our two companies to make the datacenter of the future real in the very near term."
Trailblazer partners will work with Calxeda to accelerate adoption of hyper-efficient servers, creating a rich ecosystem that end users will benefit from by ultimately delivering full systems faster. Since its August 2010 launch, Calxeda has created significant industry interest in its ARM-based servers. With Trailblazer, Calxeda is reacting to demand from customers and partners to get its chips into servers and datacenters, the first step being partner access to early silicon for Proof of Concept testing, expected this Fall. The Calxeda Trailblazer program will comprise a wide variety of industry players, software developers, hardware companies and systems integrators, including Gluster.
"The trend towards low-power and hyper-efficient compute resources matches what we are seeing in the storage market," said AB Periasamy, founder and CTO, Gluster. "Organizations want to reduce costs associated with compute and storage infrastructure while maximizing performance and we are pleased to be participating in the Calxeda Trailblazer program."
As a Trailblazer, Calxeda will provide Gluster with early access to hardware, operating system software, tools, applications and joint sales and marketing. Gluster will also receive first updates on valuable benchmarking and technical information, all intended to help both companies - and the entire ecosystem - deliver complete systems to end users faster, improving datacenter efficiency. Powered by Calxeda's high-performance, low-power ARM chips, these new servers and next generation data centers will help solve the energy consumption crisis, and will significantly increase efficiency and save money for users along the way.
Supporting Resources
Follow Gluster on the web for the latest news and information at:
* Software Appliances
* Resources
* Open Source Community
About Gluster Technology
Gluster's software-only solutions let enterprises deploy storage the same way they deploy computing today-as a virtualized, commoditized, and scale-on-demand pool, radically improving storage economics. Combined with the customer's choice of commodity computing and storage resources, Gluster can scale-out to petabytes of capacity and GB/s of throughput at a fraction of the cost of proprietary systems. Gluster ensures high availability with n-way replication both within and between public and private data centers. Gluster is deployable both on-premise (as a virtual appliance or bare-metal software appliance) and in public clouds such as Amazon Web Services. Gluster is the primary author and maintainer of the open-source GlusterFS software, which has been downloaded over 200,000 times.
About Gluster
Gluster is the leading provider of open source storage solutions for public, private and hybrid clouds. Over 150 enterprises worldwide have used Gluster in commercial deployments ranging from a few terabytes to multiple petabytes, across the most demanding applications in digital media delivery, healthcare, Internet, energy and biotech. Gluster is privately-held and headquartered in Sunnyvale, California. Visit us at www.gluster.com.
About Calxeda
Founded in January 2008, Calxeda brings unseen performance density to the datacenter on a very attractive power foot print by leveraging ultra-low power processors as used on mobile phones as a foundation for its revolutionary technology. Calxeda will make it possible for datacenter managers to increase the density of their computer resources while significantly reducing the need for power, space and cooling. At the same time, Calxeda technology will contribute to the reduction of the CO2 footprint of the datacenter in a significant way. Calxeda is funded by a unique syndicate comprising industry leading venture capital firms and semiconductor innovators, including ARM, Advanced Technology Investment Company (ATIC), Battery Ventures, Flybridge Capital Partners and Highland Capital Partners. See www.calxeda.com for more information.
Despite low levels of confidence in the banking industry, the majority (59 percent) of customers are satisfied with their banks, according to the eighth annual World Retail Banking Report released by Capgemini, UniCredit and Efma. New to this year's report is the introduction of the Capgemini Retail Banking Customer Experience Index (CEI), which gauges how customers perceive the quality of their interactions with their banks across three dimensions: products, channels and customer transactions1. Among the key findings of the CEI is that the retail branch remains an important channel for consumers despite the growing popularity of internet banking; however, the branch's role must evolve to meet changing customer needs. The CEI was developed based on a survey of nearly 14,000 bank customers across 25 countries, as well as nearly 50 in-depth interviews with senior banking executives worldwide2. It reveals that receiving superior service is far more important to customers than their bank's reputation. Globally, only 27 percent of customers said brand image is a major contributor to leaving a bank, whereas 55 percent cited service quality. As previous factors - including low prices and innovative products - are quickly losing their ability to provide a competitive edge, delivering a positive customer experience is one of the few differentiators banks can use to stand out in today's market.
According to the CEI, banks' success overall in delivering positive customer experiences is high, with an average rating of 72.2 out of 100. In North America, U.S. banks were rated the highest with a score of 78.0; Switzerland led Europe with 76.2 and India ranked highest in Asia-Pacific with 77.0. However, banks have been much less successful when it comes to delivering positive experiences on the products, channels and banking interactions that are most important to customers. Overall, only 35.8 percent of customers had a positive experience on factors they highlighted as most important to their banking experience. "Capgemini's CEI was built with the understanding that a gap exists between what banks perceive as important to customers and what customers say is most important," said Jean Lassignardie, Global Head of Sales and Marketing, Capgemini Financial Services. "The CEI seeks to align the product, life cycle, and delivery channel capabilities of banks with the values and standards of their customers, providing banks with additional insights to set better business and channel strategies." Banks need to focus on customer experience across banking channels According to the CEI, banks are seeing the largest gap in meeting customers' needs in the area of banking channels. Customers in different regions have varying perceptions of the importance of different channels. Local factors, such as a country's technological infrastructure, and customer comfort and experience with technology are important variables. Banks need to identify the channels that are most important to their customers and offer the most positive experiences for those specific channels.
Keywords: Advertising, Asia, Capgemini, China, Finance, Financial Services, India, Investing, Investment, Marketing, Technology.
This article was prepared by Journal of India editors from staff and other reports. Copyright 2011, Journal of India via VerticalNews.com.
Ireland's alternative broadband operator, Magnet Networks, has introduced a new Internet television service which also allows viewers to access social networking Web sites like Facebook. According to web portal Business & Leadership, the broadband operator's new service would also provide users of any service provider with access to five TV channels for free. Any user of Magnet which currently has a 1Mbps broadband service would need to get registered on magnetwebtv.ie to access the TV channels. The service also obviates the need to pay license or cable subsection fees.
DUBLIN -- Research and Markets (http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/2e913b/voip_in_cee_opport) has announced the addition of the "VoIP in CEE Opportunities and Forecast, 2010 - 2015" report to their offering.
Broadband Network Expansion Drives VoIP Growth in CEE
The telecoms infrastructure in the Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) region has undergone massive transformation over the past decade. Service providers, keen on taking advantage of the region's growing wealth and openness to the outside world, have invested significant resources in the deployment of modern telecoms networks. The transformation, coupled with increasing levels of disposable income, is resulting in the growing demand for more advanced telecoms services, including broadband.
Indeed, CEE is one of the world's fastest growing regions in terms of new broadband subscriber uptake. BMI forecasts show that fixed broadband subscriptions in the region will exceed 115mn by 2015, almost double the estimated number of connections at the end the end of 2010.
BMI notes that the rapid uptake in broadband services has opened the door of opportunity for various IP-based services. Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) is one such opportunity. VoIP is particularly attracting a lot of attention from residential and business broadband users alike because of the significant cost savings it affords them, especially on international calls, compared to rates charged for such calls on traditional wireline and mobile networks. Indeed, the European Union's European Regulators Group (ERG) has welcomed the introduction of VoIP services in the region and is committed to adopting a regulatory approach that will enable the greatest possible level of innovation and competitiveness in the market.
Although most initial VoIP subscriptions were based on fixed broadband access provided by small low-cost operators as well as multi-play offerings from larger cable network and xDSL service providers, we expect wireless broadband access to play a leading role in future expansion of VoIP services in CEE. With limited expansion of fixed broadband infrastructure expected in the region due to expensive rollout costs, high population levels in rural areas and very difficult topography in some cases, BMI believes that mobile platforms now offer a genuine opportunity to service providers. This view is strongly supported by the rapid deployment of next generation wireless networks, such as WiMAX, in many countries in the region. At the same time, advanced smartphones and other mobile devices, capable of sending and receiving high-speed data communications, are beginning to offer a variety of options in the delivery of VoIP services
For more information visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/2e913b/voip_in_cee_opport
WASHINGTON -- The following information was released by the Department of Defense American Forces Press Service:
By Lisa Daniel
American Forces Press Service
WASHINGTON, June 4, 2010 -- Army Gen. Raymond T. Odierno, reflecting on lessons learned and the way ahead as the outgoing top commander in Iraq, voiced concerns today about how the ease of Internet communications sometimes undermine military operations.
"One of the things we have continued to work hard at is the change in global communications and its impact on warfare," Odierno said during a Pentagon press briefing. "It's absolutely essential that we take a hard look at how we're going to address this issue."
Odierno, who commanded the Army's 3rd Corps in Iraq from May 2006 until taking over U.S. Forces Iraq in September 2008, is not the first military leader to voice concerns about how the unregulated and ubiquitous nature of Internet communications undermine security efforts. Army Gen. David H. Petraeus, commander of Multinational Force Iraq before becoming commander of U.S. Central Command in October 2008, voiced similar concerns during budget hearings on Capitol Hill earlier this year.
Odierno and others have raised concerns about al-Qaida and other terrorist groups' recruiting and public relations efforts on the Internet. Even as military operations chip away at the groups' insurgencies in Iraq and Afghanistan - killing or capturing 34 of 42 al-Qaida in Iraq leaders in the past three months - militant websites don't reflect that.
"What they're telling people on their website is completely different than what is happening on the ground," the general said.
Odierno, whom President Barack Obama has nominated to head the Norfolk, Va.-based U.S. Joint Forces Command after rotating out of Iraq at the end of summer, endorsed the Defense Department's new Cyber Command to work on such Internet issues.
The U.S. military has been the target of numerous e-mail scams, Odierno said, including the social networking site, Facebook. His own Facebook site has been used in schemes to extort money, he said.
"These are real challenges to us that we really have to get after," he said.
Army Lt. Gen. Lloyd Austin has been chosen to replace Odierno as commander of U.S. Forces Iraq.
By KEN BALLEN and PATRICK DOHERTY
THE ELECTION results in Iran may reflect the will of the Iranian people. Many experts are claiming that the margin of victory of incumbent President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was the result of fraud or manipulation, but our nationwide public opinion survey of Iranians three weeks before the vote showed Ahmadinejad leading by more than a 2-to-1 margin -- greater than his apparent margin of victory in Friday's election.
While Western news reports from Tehran in the days leading up to the voting portrayed an Iranian public enthusiastic about Ahmadinejad's principal opponent, Mir Hossein Mousavi, our scientific sampling from across all 30 of Iran's provinces showed Ahmadinejad well ahead.
Independent and uncensored nationwide surveys of Iran are rare. Typically, pre-election polls there are either conducted or monitored by the government and are untrustworthy.
By contrast, the poll undertaken by our nonprofit organizations May 11-20 was the third in a series over the past two years. Conducted by telephone from a neighboring country, field work was carried out in Farsi by a polling company whose work in the region for ABC News and the BBC has received an Emmy Award.
The breadth of Ahmadinejad's support was apparent in our pre-election survey. During the campaign, for instance, Mousavi emphasized his identity as an Azeri, the second-largest ethnic group in Iran after Persians, to woo Azeri voters. Our survey indicated, though, that Azeris favored Ahmadinejad by 2 to 1 over Mousavi.
Much commentary has portrayed Iranian youth and the Internet as harbingers of change in this election. But our poll found that only a third of Iranians even have access to the Internet, while 18- to 24-year-olds made up the strongest voting bloc for Ahmadinejad of all age groups.
The only demographic groups in which our survey found Mousavi leading or competitive with Ahmadinejad were university students and graduates and the highest-income Iranians. When our poll was taken, almost a third of Iranians were also still undecided. Yet the baseline distributions we found then mirror the results reported by the Iranian authorities -- indicating the possibility that the vote is not the product of widespread fraud.
Some might argue that the professed support for Ahmadinejad we found simply reflected fearful respondents' reluctance to provide honest answers to pollsters. Yet the integrity of our results is confirmed by the politically risky responses Iranians were willing to give to a host of questions.
For instance, nearly four in five Iranians -- including most Ahmadinejad supporters -- said they wanted to change the political system to give them the right to elect Iran's supreme leader, who is not currently subject to popular vote. Similarly, Iranians chose free elections and a free press as their most important priorities for their government, virtually tied with improving the national economy.
These were hardly "politically correct" responses to voice publicly in a largely authoritarian society.
Indeed, and consistently among all three of our surveys over the past two years, more than 70 percent of Iranians also expressed support for providing full access to weapons inspectors and a guarantee that Iran will not develop or possess nuclear weapons, in return for outside aid and investment. And 77 percent of Iranians favored normal relations and trade with the United States, another result consistent with our previous findings.
Iranians view their support for a more democratic system, with normal relations with the United States, as consonant with their support for Ahmadinejad. They do not want him to continue his hard-line policies. Rather, Iranians apparently see Ahmadinejad as their toughest negotiator, the person best positioned to bring home a favorable deal -- rather like a Persian Nixon going to China.
Before other countries, including the United States, jump to the conclusion that the Iranian presidential elections were fraudulent, they should consider all independent information. The fact may simply be that the re-election of Ahmadinejad is what the Iranian people wanted.
Ken Ballen is president of Terror Free Tomorrow: The Center for Public Opinion, a nonprofit institute that researches attitudes toward extremism. Patrick Doherty is deputy director of the American Strategy Program at the New America Foundation. The groups' May 11-20 polling consisted of 1,001 interviews across Iran and had a margin of error of 3.1 percentage points. This column appeared earlier in The Washington Post.
NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--June 12, 1996--WinStar Communications Inc. (Nasdaq:WCII) has signed a strategic agreement with Internet access provider DIGEX Inc. for mutual provision of services.
WinStar will private label DIGEX's Industrial Strength Internet(SM) services to WinStar customers and will provide DIGEX with local access services. DIGEX is a national Internet service provider (ISP), focused on the business and institutional marketplace. WinStar is a local communications company.
WinStar will private label DIGEX's Internet services to business customers, either on a stand-alone basis, or bundled with WinStar's local and/or long-distance services. WinStar plans to purchase $10 million worth of DIGEX's Industrial Strength Internet services. These services include browsing the World Wide Web, transferring files, sending and receiving e-mail, conducting electronic commerce, and hosting servers for customer Web sites.
As part of the agreement, WinStar will be the preferred supplier to DIGEX for its local access and/or customer interconnection service requirements, through use of WinStar's 38 GHz Wireless Fiber(SM) services or through the resale of other local facilities, at competitive rates. This is WinStar's first major agreement to provide its Wireless Fiber broadband local communications service to an Internet carrier.
DIGEX is a Beltsville, Md.-based Internet service provider. Since 1991, DIGEX has delivered Internet solutions primarily for international ISPs, businesses, government agencies, and other institutional organizations. DIGEX prides itself on offering Industrial Strength Internet connections, servers, and security services, using its high speed redundant network backbone.
WinStar Communications Inc. is a full service, local telecommunications company. WinStar Wireless is a competitive access provider which provides its Wireless Fiber "last mile" telecommunications services to long-distance carriers, competitive access providers, mobile communications companies, local telephone companies, and other customers with broadband local communications needs. WinStar has licenses in the 38 GHz band in 41 of the top 45 MSAs in the United States, including the top 31 MSAs, and econcompassing more than 100 cities with populations over 100,000, with over 400 million channel pops. WinStar Telecommunications provides telecommunications services in competition with the incumbent local telephone companies. WinStar Gateway Network provides long-distance telephone service. WinStar New Media creates and distributes information services and entertainment content as a complement to WinStar's telecommunications activities. -0-
Wireless Fiber is a service mark of WinStar Communications Inc.
Industrial Strength Internet is a service mark of DIGEX Inc.
CONTACT: WinStar Communications Inc., New York
(Financial Community) Michelle Davis, Investor Relations
Manager, 212/687-7577, ext. 153
or
Technology Solutions Inc., New York
(Press) Steve Hein, 212/696-2000, ext. 250,
northstar@tsipr.com
or
DIGEX Inc., Beltsville
Nick Magliato, 301/847-5014, nickm@digex.net
DAVIE, Fla., Jan. 30 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Bristol West Holdings, Inc. today announced that it will be reporting its fourth quarter and twelve-month 2005 earnings after the close of the securities markets on Wednesday, February 22, 2006.
Bristol West will hold a one-hour conference call to review its results at 9:00 a.m. (EST) on February 23, 2006. The conference call may be accessed by dialing 1-877-209-0397.
The conference call will also be broadcast over the Internet. To listen to the call via the Internet, one needs to access the Company's website, http://www.bristolwest.com/ , click on Investor Relations, and follow the instructions at the webcast link. Additionally, subscribers to Thomson/CCBN's password-protected event management site, StreetEvents, can access the broadcast via ( http://www.streetevents.com/ ). A recorded version of the call will be made available on the Company's website shortly after the call ends, and a transcript will later be posted.
About Bristol West
Bristol West Holdings, Inc. began its operations in 1973, and provides non-standard private passenger automobile insurance exclusively through agents and brokers in 21 sates. Bristol West is traded on the New York Stock Exchange under the symbol, BRW.
For more information about Bristol West, please visit our website, http://www.bristolwest.com/ .
First Call Analyst: FCMN Contact: craig.eisenacher@bristolwest.com
CONTACT: Craig Eisenacher, Bristol West Holdings, Inc., +1-954-316-5192
Web site: http://www.bristolwest.com/
